Stories from the Edge

The Mix-Up

4.38. Nearly knock off time.

The secretary walks out of the boss' office and hands me some paperwork.

"Here you go, Phil," she says. She sits and begins to tidy her desk. "Friday again. See you at the pub later?"

"Yep, sure," I say. I wave goodbye and walk away, down the long corridor, past the labs on each side, toward the double swing doors that lead to the car park. I slow down at the blood test lab and look through the glass doors, in case the new girl is there, but I don't see her. Outside, the tropical air surrounds me and I stop and take a deep breath, enjoying the change from the hospital air conditioning. Three guys from the labs are standing to one side, smoking and chatting.

"Hey, Knuckles," one of them calls to me, "Hans is having a Berlin Wall party at his place after the pub tonight."

"A what party?" I say.

"Berlin Wall. Don't you watch TV, mate? They're pulling the wall down. It's history."

I nod. I remember seeing something about Berlin on the TV at the pub last night.

"Great," I say. "I'll be there. Who else is going?"

They laugh.

"Who won't be there, you mean," says one of the other guys. "Hans knows half the Territory."

They toss their cigarette butts on the ground and stroll out into the car park. I hurry downstairs to my office in the mortuary, whistling a tune from the radio. I put the signed form into my out tray for the Funeral Directors and pick up my backpack and I'm about to head for the bus stop when I hear noises coming through the wall, from the body fridge.

Thud, bang. Thud, thud, bang, bang.

Someone's moving the trolleys about in there. A hospital orderly, bringing in a new body, perhaps? I throw my backpack onto my desk and walk out into the corridor. On my left is the door to the loading bay and I open it and look outside. Parked there is a Funeral Director's van.

Bugger. That's bad timing.

I walk further along the corridor to the door into the body fridge and see that it's open, the padlock hanging loose. I open the door and look in.

The fridge is full of trolleys, each with a dead body on top, covered by a white sheet. Standing in the middle of the room is a young guy with long brown hair and an untidy brown beard. He's well built, with a bit of a paunch on him. He's wearing a white business shirt and black trousers like the Funeral Director guys dress in. After a few moments I recognise him as one of the new ones. He has his left arm folded across his chest, the other resting on it, his right hand combing his beard as he looks around.

"Can I help you?" I call out.

He gives a start and looks at me wide eyed.

"Oh, hi. Yeah, thanks. I'm looking for a body."

I step into the fridge, through the rush of cold air coming from the refrigeration outlet above the door.

"You've come to the right place, then," I say, smiling. I want to get this guy away so I can catch my bus.

"I was here earlier today, at lunch time. There was no one about so I did what my dad showed me. I used the key he gave me, found the body with the right tag on it and signed the book in the office."

"So what's the problem?"

He shook his head. "It's the wrong body. At the Funeral Home, getting it ready for the funeral, I realised it was a Chinese guy and the one I'm supposed to pick up isn't Chinese. It's got the wrong tag on it." He looks around. "But none of these have the right one, either."